LAS VEGAS – One bend of the rule deserved another.
A day after Oscar Duarte learned his opponent Angel Fierro weighed in more than three pounds heavy, the Mexico fighter paid him back by delivering a knockdown punch after the bell that was disallowed.
In a bout that forced Duarte to deal with the effects of the heavier opponent, he nevertheless fought through the damage and answered the post-fight booing over his split decision victory by scores of 115-113 (Patricia Morse Jarman), 112-116 (David Sutherland) and 116-112 (Stecbe Weisfeld) Saturday at T-Mobile Arena.
“People need to understand, [fighters] need to make weight,” Duarte, 31-2-1 (23 KOs), said as he was subjected to boos. “I felt [the added Fierro weight], but I won the fight. I’m a real warrior.”
Fierro missed weight by more than three pounds Friday, but after Duarte saw former IBF 140lbs titleholder Richardson Hitchins withdraw from their February 21 bout, citing illness after making the second-day weigh-in, Duarte approved the fight going forward and received an undisclosed financial settlement.
Fierro, after appearing at Wednesday’s media workout with a full mop of hair, showed up at the fight bald, as if he had made a desperate attempt to make the 140lbs weight limit the morning earlier.
Following two cautious rounds, Duarte went after Fierro’s body and got the better of their exchanges in the third.
Duarte rocked Fierro, 23-5-2 (18 KOs), late in the fourth round with a power punch, and as the bell rang, Duarte unleashed another wicked right that knocked Fierro to the canvas.
Referee Mark Nelson ruled no knockdown and only warned Duarte, stopping short of deducting a point.
Duarte came out attacking to start the fifth, igniting quality back-and-forth action in which both men endured neck-bending blows from the other.
Fierro blasted Duarte with five straight rights to the head to close the sixth.
The punishment on Duarte extended into the seventh, but even as the Mexican fighter was left to withstand head-turning shots, he remained in the pocket and threw punches back, much to the crowd’s delight.
Duarte landed an effective combination in the eighth, then hurt Fierro with a body blow in the ninth as the toll of the damage set an ominous tone for whatever conclusion awaited.
With trainer Robert Garcia urging Duarte on before the 11th, the No. 3-ranked IBF and WBA contender paid no mind to his past defensive transgressions and bulled ahead to keep Fierro backstepping.
Duarte accelerated his hand speed and pressure on Fierro in the 12th, but Fierro rallied in the second minute before both let the final minute pass as a sign of their fatigue over the ordeal.
As Fierro suffered his fourth loss in five bouts, Duarte promised he will return, eager to entertain.
Earlier, Tito Sanchez and Jorge Chavez produced a scintillating toe-to-toe battle, with Sanchez scoring a 10th-round TKO victory in junior featherweight action.
The bout grew impressively impassioned throughout the ninth round as each threw punches endlessly.
The back-and-forth wearied Chavez, evidenced by his getting staggered by two big right hands from Sanchez, 16-0 (10 KOs).
That led Sanchez to first send Chavez, 15-1-1 (8 KOs), to the canvas with a hard right hand. Chavez arose in the nick of time before the 10-count, but then Sanchez pounced and landed a finishing combination anchored by a right to the head that sent Chavez flailing forward into the ropes in front of him.
Leaving the crowd roaring in appreciation, the time of the finish was 2:30 of the final round.
Chavez, 26, from San Diego, earned his pay-per-view slot by fighting Golden Boy Promotions’ prospect Manuel Flores to a July draw before defeating him by unanimous decision in January in Palm Springs, California.
Argentina’s Ismael Flores opened the pay-per-view portion of the card by upsetting Mexico’s previously unbeaten junior middleweight Isaac Lucero, of Mexico, by unanimous decision scores of 98-92, 98-92, 99-91.
Lucero, ranked No. 4 by the WBA and No. 14 by the IBF, found his effort jarred by repeated head shots from Flores, the WBA’s No. 9 contender.
Lucero, 27, began fight week with his trainer, Bob Santos, telling BoxingScene that his fighter had a chance to vie to become the country’s next big name,
Instead, leaving himself open to right hands and to ridicule for Santos’ claim, he is heading back home in defeat and to assess the flawed performance.
Residing now in Barcelona, Flores, 18-1-1 (12 KOs), found success with his head-hunting mission, and staggered Lucero, 18-1 (14 KOs), in the 10th to convincingly close his impressive performance and post his eighth consecutive victory.
Earlier, Milwaukee’s unbeaten super middleweight Daniel Blancas, 15-0, cruised to a unanimous decision victory over Raul Solomon, 16-4-1, by scores of 99-91, 99-91, 100-90.
Golden Boy Promotions’ recent super-lightweight signee Dylan Capetillo defeated Phoenix’s James Pierce by three scores of 39-37 to notch his second pro victory.
Colombia light-heavyweight Juan Carrillo 15-0, a promising talent handled by Benavidez promoter Sampson Lewkowicz, knocked out Ecuador’s Marlon Delgado 8-1 in the fourth round.
Carrillo first hurt Delgado with a left to the midsection, and as Delgado delayed the inevitable by shrinking to the canvas and avoiding a knockdown ruling, he absorbed a harder, wound-up right hand to the same area and crashed down as referee Thomas Taylor counted him out.
Super-lightweight Javier Meza, an Amarillo, Texas product trained in the Coachella Valley of California by Joel Diaz, posted a fifth-round TKO of Damonte Smith to improve to 6-0 with three KOs.
Lightweights Julio Ocampo Hernandez and Carlos Lewis fought to a draw with scores of 57-57, 58-56 Hernandez and 58-56 for Lewis,
Middleweight Petr Khamukov 14-1 opened the 12-fight card with a unanimous-decision victory over Bernard Joseph.
Lance Pugmire is BoxingScene’s senior U.S. writer and an assistant producer for ProBox TV. Pugmire has covered boxing since the early 2000s, first at the Los Angeles Times and then at The Athletic and USA Today. He won the Boxing Writers’ Association of America’s Nat Fleischer Award in 2022 for career excellence.
